Live Blogs A return to ''The Room'' of kids' books - The Adventures of Archie Reynolds! - a truly special kind of awesome awfulness

BonsaiForest2014-11-05 20:24:53

I wrote a liveblog about this before, but it was deleted because I said some dodgy things about the author. So I'll be more careful with my language.

Annnd, for those who missed it the first time, I am revisiting one of the most gloriously awful books ever written. The Adventures of Archie Reynolds.

It sounds inoffensive enough. The concept combines Slice of Life comedy about a group of kids just doing kid stuff, and an adventure involving jewel thieves. Having enjoyed books such as A Spy in the Neighborhood when I was a kid, I was having to revisit this concept again. And besides, I am the person who started the Literature thread topic "Okay, admit it, who here reads kids' books?" I'm hoping I can one day pass off some of my favorite books to my nephew and niece when they're old enough for them. But this won't be one of them!

Now, A Spy in the Neighborhood is an example of how Slice of Life and adventure in the neighborhood can be done well. But... I'll get to that later. I'd rather talk about this book's sins first.

So, let's open up! Starting with the cover.

Wow. A lot of effort has clearly been put into this. It must have taken forever to get those kids together to photoshop them onto a generic green hill with no other features.

I can't tell what the boy in the dark blue shirt is resting his arm on. It's clearly not Archie (presumably the orange-haired kid front and center is Archie, since he's the main character after all), because if you look closely, his arm is behind Archie's shirt. Almost as if - wait for it - he was photoshopped in there and they tried their best to make it look as if he's resting his arm on Archie's shoulder.

The girl to the left of Archie is presumably Amanda, the most important of the female characters. I'll get to who the characters are later, but I'm going by placement here. Is she standing just to the left of Archie, or behind him? Judging by size, she should be standing just to the side of him. Judging by placement, she's standing behind him, but the perspective looks all wrong. It's almost as if she was photoshopped in or something.

The two boys in the background are probably the bullies. I can tell because... because they're in the distance, there's two of them, and they're vaguely threatening? One is pointing his fingers like a gun, the other holding a snowball. Or a baseball? In the book, he uses a snowball, and baseballs are mentioned nowhere.

So I at least figured out who Archie and Amanda are, and the two bullies. I see one other girl and three other boys. That doesn't add up. The main characters are Archie and his friends Billy and Hank, who are with him almost all the time, as we'll soon see. Amanda also has two friends who are girls. But unless one of the kids on the left is a baby butch, I don't see three girls; I see two.

I wonder if whoever slopped this cover together even bothered to read the story in detail? At least they made an effort to figure out who the most important characters are, but they didn't quite make it.

Let's check the back cover.

Sounds pretty standard. Again, I like the idea of mixing Slice of Life with local adventure a lot. I enjoyed books like My Teacher Is an Alien and Fourth-Grade Celebrity (yeah, I know it's meant for girls, and I'm a guy, but it's a pretty gender neutral story that anyone could enjoy) as a kid, and mixing the two together sounds like a great idea.

I wonder what the shocking, chilling answers are to the questions of who built the mysterious hidden tunnel, what's in it, and why it's there. And seeing Archie tangle with a neighborhood bully and his pal - wait, don't you mean two bullies? - and three flowering girls from the neighborhood. Flowering? What does that even mean? Hold on, lemme check a dictionary site:

Ah, I get it. So Amanda and her friends produce flowers of some specific type at a particular time of day. Except that they don't. And now my vocabulary has been increased.

I also note there are reviews of this book as well, right on the back cover. Let's take a look at them.

Nice! So many ringing endorsements from New Jersey-based school teachers and school administrators. This has gotta be good quality literature.

Well, soon we'll find out, as I take an in-depth look at the story. As the book lacks illustrations, I enlisted the help of Sam Pointon to bring some of its more visual scenes to life.

Comments

Knowlessman Since: Dec, 1969

Nov 10th 2014 at 7:42:57 PM

...I just now realized that Archie and the Yes-Man Hivemind are the only protagonists of this book; I've been waiting in suspense for the rest of the crew to show up and make the book actually feel populated.

This book basically has as good as one protagonist, maybe one-and-a-half. Hasn't the author ever read anything more complicated than See Spot Run? A book can have one protagonist and not be shit, even without regular supporting characters, but this is not accomplishing that. This is pretending to have multiple protagonists, but two of them don't even count because there is nothing to differentiate the personality of either one of them from that of the main character.

Knowlessman Since: Dec, 1969

Nov 10th 2014 at 7:45:49 PM

Archie could just have the most boring case of multiple personality disorder in fiction, and the feel of this book would be absolutely unchanged.

BonsaiForest Since: Dec, 1969

Nov 10th 2014 at 7:48:03 PM

Exactly, Knowless. I was thinking that one thing that makes stories fun is seeing character interaction. Characters who have different opinions and personalities, who play off each other in fun ways - this book has none of that. I've seen books where I've complained that the characters had no personality because they had flat personalities... here, they have NO personality! Billyhank is virtually not there! And Janetcindy is even less there, due to having no dialog!

Even a story with only one protagonist can still be good if that character's thoughts are shown and they're interesting. But this story can't accomplish that. Archie, Billy and Hank are airheads.

BonsaiForest Since: Dec, 1969

Nov 10th 2014 at 7:49:40 PM

In order for him to have multiple personality disorder, he'd have to have multiple personalities. The key word here is "personality" moreso than "multiple".

Archie, Billy and Hank have no personality, and are basically the same character. So if Archie had multiple personality disorder, he'd only be imagining that two other people who share his opinions and have none of their own are standing with him the whole time, and sometimes he's really them.

Valiona Since: Dec, 1969

Nov 11th 2014 at 1:00:26 PM

BonsaiForest

I agree that character interaction makes things interesting. When I write, I often like having characters interact when their personalities mesh well in certain ways, whether being similar or starkly contrasting. It seems as though, with very little in the way of character personalities, nothing like that could happen here.

On a side note, this liveblog has nice commentary, and it's good to see it updated regularly. Keep it up.

BonsaiForest Since: Dec, 1969

Nov 11th 2014 at 2:00:12 PM

Yeah, lack of character personalities means that this is 100% a "what the characters do" story. While obviously what characters do is important, this author doesn't seem to understand anything else. And he fails even at having that part make sense.

And thanks! I'll try to keep up the consistent updates, one chapter a day. Some chapters pack so much amazing stupid into them that writing them takes hours. But knowing that people are enjoying the blog makes it worth it!

Medinoc Since: Dec, 1969

Sep 15th 2015 at 10:58:59 AM

Graveyards can totally have streets, you know. My grandfather lies in a big military cemetery that does.

Of course, I wouldn't expect that in a small-town churchyard.

Medinoc Since: Dec, 1969

Sep 15th 2015 at 11:09:03 AM

Also, your Idiot Plot comment is probably tainted by having read the book in advance, because here at least there's a good explanation:

1. Burglars rob house, find safe and clue.
2. Burglars tape clue to safe.
3. Burglars hide stolen safe in their hideout, and go hunt for a street corner (or simply more houses for now).

Of course, maybe you know from already having read the book that it can't be the case, but here, it's as if the upcoming "shocking twist" that it's the burglar hideout is being "subtly" foreshadowed with all the grace of an anvil.

Medinoc Since: Dec, 1969

Sep 16th 2015 at 11:11:11 AM

Added: after reading the liveblog to its end, it turns out my assessment was inexact, and the actual story made much less sense.

BonsaiForest Since: Dec, 1969

Nov 2nd 2015 at 10:37:19 AM

Lol, it was indeed the burglar hideout, though, and I doubt I'm spoiling anything by admitting that in the comments! You're right that while that one aspect of the plot was accurate, the actual story makes less sense because of all the details surrounding it.

BrokenArrow01 Since: Dec, 1969

Nov 18th 2015 at 1:05:50 AM

The author is from another dimension where cemeteries have streets with names. That is the only reason I can think of why this dude wrote that sentence. Also, sorry I haven't commented on this sooner!

Medinoc Since: Dec, 1969

Jul 28th 2018 at 6:45:22 AM

This is a test comment to see if the pager is still buggy.

Edit: It appears not.